| Biography | Neil Finkelstein is a partner in our Litigation Group in Toronto. Mr. Finkelstein has a national practice, having appeared in major cases in eight of Canada's ten provinces, and has been lead counsel in numerous leading Canadian competition, securities, constitutional, pension, commercial cases at every level of court up to and including many appeals in the Supreme Court of Canada. Mr. Finkelstein has been counsel in 23 appeals in the Supreme Court of Canada, 46 appeals in courts of appeal across Canada, and 97 major trials and hearings in courts and senior administrative tribunals across Canada. He has acted as successful counsel in five of the six contested merger cases decided under the Competition Act. Mr. Finkelstein was law clerk to the Right Honourable Bora Laskin, Chief Justice of Canada, in 1980-81, and senior policy advisor to the attorney general of Ontario in 1985-86. He is a life bencher of The Law Society of Upper Canada, a fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers and an honorary fellow of COMBAR (UK). He became an advocacy advisor to the Supreme Court Advocacy Institute in January 2007. He has advised both federal and provincial governments on constitutional reform and taught constitutional law courses at Osgoode Hall Law School and the University of Toronto Faculty of Law. As well, Mr. Finkelstein was co-counsel to the Gomery Commission into Sponsorships and Advertising by the Government of Canada in 2004-05. In that capacity, he examined Prime Minister Paul Martin, the first time a sitting prime minister of Canada had been examined at a public inquiry since Sir John A. MacDonald at the Canadian Pacific Railway Commission in 1873. The Canadian Legal Lexpert Directory cites Mr. Finkelstein as one of the most frequently recommended lawyers in the areas of competition law and corporate commercial litigation. He is also listed in Chambers Global: The World's Leading Lawyers for Business, Lexpert/American Lawyer Guide to the Leading 500 Lawyers in Canada, Media Group's Guide to the World's Leading Competition and Antitrust Lawyers, PLC Which Lawyer? Yearbook and The Best Lawyers in Canada. He was profiled in the Financial Post Business Magazine, July/August 2008, "Special Report - The Best Lawyers in Canada," in administrative and public law, class action litigation, competition/antitrust law, corporate and commercial litigation, securities law and international arbitration. Mr. Finkelstein has lectured extensively on constitutional law topics and published extensively in the areas of constitutional, administrative and competition law. His publications include Finkelstein, Laskin's Canadian Constitutional Law (5th edition), Finkelstein and Finkelstein, Constitutional Rights in the Investigative Process and The Laskin Legacy: Essays in Commemoration of Chief Justice Bora Laskin (as co-editor). Mr. Finkelstein earned his BA degree from McGill University in 1973, and his CA in 1975. He received his LLB from McGill University in 1979, and his LLM from Harvard Law School in 1980. He was called to the Ontario bar in 1982. |